Death and Life. Fire! Fire! Smoke in all my noses, noses staying open to breathe that no longer possible to dream freshness of clean air, smoke in the house, smoke in our hair, on our heads fuming out through vents where we remember to keep our heads open, smoke on the trees, ashes in the air falling on our shoulders when we dare go outside. An apocalyptic sky, never seen before here in our safe zones, nuclear invasions can compare, or the expectation of army trucks and thousands of refuges moving in unison as a snake. This is year of the snake, changes winding along shedding old ways, filing up and down our roadways hungry and thirsty for the unattainable waters. Visions of refreshment. How many days can we stay indoors, thinking we will all be okay. NO NO we are not okay, we must change.

And maybe so, maybe I am just dramatic, histrionic,,,, maybe this will blow over like a dead friend, as death does... I wonder about the trees, I have not been in mind of tree for a long time, does a tree easily sacrifice it's green life force to fire, to wind, or does a tree struggle too as the humans, trying to stay rooted as if it deserves all life, as if it it is still youthful? Does it have within it's memory the knowingness of new trees coming to replace it, does that make it sing and bow and bend to the ground in joy? Does it feel free in it's burning death, unlike an uprooted mass of green branch when bulldozed down for the pleasure of human creatures? The owl living in the giant oak tree, centuries old, how does it feel when it's young neighbor is burned down? Does the owl accept quietly, or does it screech, will enough shade protect the owlets from the heat and blaze of the summer sun's fire blast? Trees please tell us now the answers we seek.

We can become fanatical, maniacal, or irrepressible, we can enjoy the strange beauty of this “natural” disaster, bright light coming through smoke ceilings, no more sunsets as we have known them, fear!! Faulty leaks of smoke of gray orange stripes on the floor where sunlight used to pour in, now reddened bits of glow, blood red sun bright pinks glaring and burning our eyes. This is smoke in an eerie blazey haze. We dream rain, we pray rain, we dream calm breeze, we pray calmness, we dream clarity. Have we forgotten our heads, have we forgotten our humanity to ourselves and to our all unity with the earth and with the creatures near the trees and to the lightening bolts and to the little sparks that ignite our imaginations, have we forgotten our dignity and our responsibilities to our physical beings, to our communities and to our worlds as we have known them, that perhaps our world is disintegrating before our eyes, in our immobility and in our blameworthy attitudes, in our forgetfulness of our gratitude for the beautiful planet we have been put upon, where are we going. There is really nowhere to go to avoid this smoke infested wind, there are fires all around us, surrounding our special spot of heaven on earth , there are fires near our big cities too, hurricanes due earlier than “normal”, disasters around many corners of pockets of enveloped pleasure seeked spots. Where will we go, how will we find enough water to quench the fires and to wet our dry appetites, where have the flowers gone, where is my mother???